RAMANI’S CREATIVE TOUCH

‘A Genius Uncorked’ screamed a newspaper headline, following his path-breaking exhibition on cork as an art medium.  He was probably the first in the world to use cork as an art medium.

Viswanathan Venkat Ramani’s tryst with destiny started with his interest in painting.  Hailing from Ariyanayakipuram, near Mukkadal in the Tirunelveli district of Tamil Nadu, he had his school education in three major cities of India – Delhi, Kolkata and Chennai, thanks to his father’s job in the Public Works Department.

Ramani started painting at the age of 11 and his uncle who noticed his interest in fine arts helped him join the Government College of Arts and Crafts in Chennai after his schooling.  After learning the basics, Ramani went on to join, the Delhi Cloth Mills, where he worked for three and a half years, as a textile designer.  He says, “I was then offered a position of designer at Premier Mills, Coimbatore.  Unfortunately the atmosphere there was so stifling that I left the job within a matter of weeks and came back to Chennai.  I started doing designer bedspreads and even held exhibitions, but Chennai then was not prepared for all this”. 

A stint in the movies followed where he worked as assistant to Art Director, P Krishnamoorthy for the Malayalam movie Swathi Thirunal.  The chaotic and unorganised world of film making certainly did not appeal to Ramani who switched to a different medium of art designing – he started designing clock dials and moulds for the Bifora Clock Company of Bangalore. 

It was at this time that he saw cork being used for interior decoration and happened to express his interest in using cork as an art medium to one of the sales persons.  A year later a call came from Cork Industries, asking whether he was still interested in doing it.  Ramani accepted it and as he put it, “What I did, got me the kind of coverage, which I certainly did not imagine.  From big features and reviews in papers like Hindu and Indian Express, I had even Doordarshan coming and covering the exhibition.  The pick of the lot in this exhibition was the Govardhana Giridhari (depicting Krishna carrying the Govardhan mountain), which measured 8 feet by 10 feet and was so large that it could not be brought into the exhibition hall and was placed at the entrance.  I had used a motor to create the rain effect.  It was so nice that almost all newspapers, which covered that exhibition snapped me with it”.

After this came a call from the National Institute of Fashion Technology, Ahmedabad, for a one-year faculty-training programme.  And then it was back to Chennai again, this time at Radha Silks, Mylapore where he designed sarees and a collection of tribal designs for them.  “What was memorable from my 4-5 year stint here was the revival of the traditional ‘pavadai-davani’ .  Some of the other things that I have done include the 'Thombais', which are traditional chariot decorations.  I used different designs, colours and forms to create these thombais”.

When asked about his entry into designing stages he said “I had been interested in music having had formal tutoring in Carnatic music, and to a certain extent the interest had also extended to dance.  I was called to do the stage for a dance programme at the Krishna Gana Sabha. But to do something about which I knew nothing was a little frightening.  Anyway, I went ahead and during the 'December Music Festival' in the month of Marghazi that year had the top sabhas calling me to do their stage.  That was how I got into making stages for music and dance programmes.  In between all this, I started a shop ‘Creative Touch’ where I sold my creations but it did not do so well.  So when I started offering my services, I decided to give life to that name and that is how the name ‘Creative Touch' came about”.

It was Mrs. Gomathi Viswanathan of the Kala Mandir Trust who got Ramani started on to designing stages and backdrops for marriages, something at which he has become quite an expert.  He started with doing it for her daughter’s marriage and offers it today as part of the other services from ‘Creative Touch’.  As for his foray into designing dance costumes, artists for whom he had done sets, asked him to design their dance costumes.  He has so far designed, for artists like Anita Ratnam, Priyadarshini Govind and Indira Kadambi. 

Collages are yet another favourite art form of this artist, which is evident as he displays his collages to us with some pride.  “I find it a very exciting art form where, diverse and fragmented images come together to form a composite image” he says.

Well! has he exhausted all mediums of expressions?  “No!  I am looking forward to doing something different and exciting and I am open to all kinds of ideas.  As for immediate plans, I want to go back to my painting and have an exhibition later this year”.

For more details, Contact: Ramani, 51, Eldams Road, Alwarpet,
Chennai 600 018. 
Phone: 435 3152.

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